Bengal Finance Minister slams Centre over dole that never came

Adamant: West Bengal Finance Minister Amit Mitra insisted that the state government has not received a penny from the Centre

The Congress-Trinamool Congress ties once again hit a new low on Monday as West Bengal finance minister Amit Mitra rebutted Congress spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi's statement and claimed that the state has not received a penny from the Centre in the past eight months.

On Sunday, Singhvi had said the Centre had provided funds of around Rs8,000 crore to bail out Mamata Banerjee's government since it assumed office in May 2011.

'The state government has not received a penny from the Centre so far. We have a debt of Rs2.03 lakh crore, taken during the erstwhile Left Front government.

'As a result, the state has to repay a loan of Rs22,000 crore which automatically gets deducted from the treasury each year,' Mitra said.

He said the state is paying Rs15.2 crore as interest and Rs6,900 crore as the principal amount.

'It would have been great if the Centre had waived the huge interest temporarily to give a sort of financial relief to the state,' Mitra pointed out.

Last week, CM Mamata had criticised the Congress-led UPA for not keeping their pre-poll promises. She had said the Union government never dished out any financial assistance to her debt-ridden state even after five meetings with finance minister Pranab Mukherjee.

The feisty Trinamool chief further made a threat, saying that the people of Bengal knew how to assert their rights if the Centre did not help.

Earlier, Mamata had locked horns with the Congress as her party, with 20 MPs in the Lok Sabha, had opposed the Centre on policies such as the Teesta water-sharing agreement with Bangladesh, FDI in retail, Lokayukta clause in the Lokpal Bill and the fuel price hike. Now the battle has further intensified with Mamata and Mitra's candid declaration on non-cooperation from the Union government.

When asked why the Centre is not financially assisting Bengal, Mitra said: 'You should ask this question to them. We are still hopeful that it would do something for the state. They are also aware that it is necessary for the state to come out of this dire financial crisis.'

He added that the state government had already submitted a detailed project report on the backward development projects but it had not received any fund under this scheme too.